The present invention relates generally to automatic tape loading machines and more particularly to a method and apparatus for finding one end of tape wound onto a reel.
Typically, the loading of tape cassettes has been carried out in semi-automatically operated loading machines. In these machines the cassettes to be loaded are automatically fed, one at a time, to a loading station. While in the loading station, a predetermined amount of magnetic tape, coming from a supply reel of tape mounted on a rotatable support hub, is wound into a cassette.
Generally, these loading machines are automated so that manual intervention in operation is substantially limited to the supply of empty cassettes into magazines associated with the machines and/or the periodic replacement of empty pancakes (see e.g. U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,836,464 and 5,125,587).
Despite this degree of automation the execution of these manual operations limits the number of machines which can be entrusted to a single operator.
Frequently, in order to replace an empty pancake, the operator, after removing the empty pancake and replacing it with a new one, must manually pick up the tape end of the new pancake and guide it, in a predetermined path, between different components of the loading machine (see e.g. U.S Pat. No. 4,602,748). The time necessary for carrying out this operation greatly reduces the ability of an operator to manage several loading machines.
Thus, clear benefit would be derived if tape loading machines were able to automatically locate and pick up the tape end from the new pancake mounted on the hub and thereafter thread the tape between the different components of the loading machine.
The same Applicant has devised an apparatus capable of performing the pickup and threading functions which is the object of U.S. Patent Application Ser. No. 07/585,809 in the name of the same Applicant entitled Tape Threading Apparatus which is incorporated herein by reference.
The same Applicant has also developed a tape loading apparatus equipped with a plurality of loading modules each having a loading station where cassettes are loaded with tape. In this apparatus, the replacement of empty tape pancakes associated with the different modules is carried out automatically by a manipulating unit. The loading machine as well as the manipulating unit associated therewith are the subject matter of U.S. Patent Application Ser. Nos. 07/585,395, now U.S. Pat. No. 5,125,587, and 07/585,710 filed in the name of the same Applicant entitled Tape Loading Center and Apparatus for Supplying Tape Machines with Reels of Tape respectively, which are incorporated herein by reference.
The apparatus for picking up the tape from the pancake can perform its functions only if the pancake, after being mounted on the hub, is disposed in such a manner that the end of the tape wound thereon is located at a point from which it can be easily picked up by a grasping element associated with the apparatus. Since the pancake is most easily mounted on the hub in a completely random manner, the apparatus for picking up the tape is preferably assisted by means capable of finding the tape end on the circumference of the pancake.